


bring it home

by cuubism



Series: Tumblr Prompts [6]
Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Depression, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt Magnus Bane, Injury, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Suicidal Thoughts, Supportive Alec Lightwood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-03
Updated: 2020-09-03
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:34:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26274958
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cuubism/pseuds/cuubism
Summary: “Come on, Magnus,” Alec says, soft, teasing. “You think I’m happy all the time?Me?How could I expect that of you?”“I’m not saying I’m supposed tobehappy all the time,” Magnus protests. “I just don’t want to bring ithome.”
Relationships: Magnus Bane/Alec Lightwood
Series: Tumblr Prompts [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1887421
Comments: 24
Kudos: 169





	bring it home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Malec_Lover23](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Malec_Lover23/gifts).



> prompt by @magnuslightwood-bane0414 on tumblr:
>
>> I would love to see your take on 39: Having a bad day and the other noticing. You write Malec so well thank you for sharing your talent with us :)

Magnus knows he’s supposed to be paying attention. He knows this cabinet meeting is important and Alec’s probably going to ask him to share the warlock community’s input soon, but he just can’t bring himself to care.

He’s so tired.

Alec’s eyeing him from across the table. “Well!” he says suddenly, clapping his hands, “it seems like we still have some work to do, so why don’t we table the rest of this for next week?”

When there are no immediate objections, he ends the meeting rather abruptly and comes around the table to find Magnus.

“Hey,” Alec says as the rest of the council files out, laying a hand on Magnus’s arm. “You feeling okay?”

“Of course. Why?”

“You seemed a little…” he bites his lip rather adorably. “Never mind. Are we still on for tonight?”

Magnus blinks at him. “On…?”

“Our date,” Alec reminds him, ducking to try to catch Magnus’s eye. He knows it’s not like Magnus to forget this sort of thing. “Dinner…?”

Magnus’s brain spins as he tries to remember what he committed himself to. It’s not that he doesn’t _want_ to go on a date with Alec—Lord knows it’s been too long since they’ve done something romantic—but he’s just—

“We can go home, instead, if you want,” Alec says. He can always read Magnus so well.

Magnus tries to offer him a smile. “That would be lovely. I just have one more client to attend to, and then I’ll meet you?”

“Okay…” Alec still seems like he wants to say something else, but he doesn’t. Instead he leans in to press a quick kiss to Magnus’s lips. “Be safe.”

Magnus tries. He tries to be safe. But it’s rather difficult when his “client” turns out to be a gigantic many-headed demon summoned to… test him? Torment him? He really isn’t sure.

It’s hard to be safe when he’s thinking _I really wish I was facedown on the floor right now_ instead of _oh shit the teeth are coming at me._

He throws up a blast of magic to shove the demon back, but not before it gets one of its sets of teeth in his thigh—teeth which tear through his flesh as the demon hurtles backward on the wave of his magic.

The demon snarls, and Magnus staggers on the leg which is now sending waves of pain up through his body, and for a brief, horrible moment, he considers just—letting the thing get him.

He’s so _tired_.

But he doesn’t get the chance to find out if he’d really have done that. A very familiar whip latches around one of the demon’s heads and yanks it backwards, and then Jace lunges in front of the thing in a flash of blond hair and stabs it in the chest with a blade.

The demon shrieks and disintegrates, leaving silence. It’s only in the absence of the creature’s howling that Magnus realizes how loud it is in his own head.

Izzy appears before him, curling her whip around her arm. “Magnus, are you okay? You didn’t come to fight this thing alone, did you?”

Magnus sighs. “No, my dear, it was supposed to be a _client_.” Speaking of which, he needs to track that person down. But he’s too exhausted to do it right now.

There’s also the matter of—

“Holy shit, are you bleeding?”

That’s Jace, wiping his blade off on his thigh and staring at Magnus’s shredded leg.

Magnus forces a smile. “Nothing a little magic can’t fix. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I believe I’m late for a date.”

They exchange a look, but don’t try to stop him as he limps out the door.

Magnus walks. He’s not sure where he’s going, but it’s not home. He can’t go home. He _can’t._ He can’t sit in his comfortable living room and watch Alec cook him dinner and be happy and pretend like he isn’t bleeding somewhere. Everywhere.

So he walks. And eventually he winds up by the river, one of those industrial piers that isn’t quite a _beach_ but is the closest he can get without truly leaving the city. And he sits down on the edge, looking out over the water.

It’s completely dark now, the lights of the city reflecting on the waves, and the current lapping against the pier is just loud enough to white out a bit of the noise in his head. It’s… peaceful. Almost. He tries to breathe.

He’s barely there thirty minutes before Alec’s sitting down next to him.

Magnus sighs and studiously avoids looking at him. “Did your siblings send you?”

“No, I tracked you when you didn’t come home,” Alec says. “You weren’t answering your phone.”

“I’m sorry,” Magnus murmurs.

“Something’s been bothering you all day,” Alec says. “Do you want to talk about it?”

_Nothing’s_ bothering him. Nothing _real._ “No. I just couldn’t… be at home right now. I’m sorry.”

“If you want to be alone,” Alec says, “you can just say so, and I’ll leave. I don’t want to push you out of your home.”

_“Our_ home,” Magnus corrects.

“Still. I can go to the Institute if you need space. I don’t want you wandering on the streets.”

Maybe, Magnus thinks, he needed to do a bit of wandering. Although his leg is throbbing dully now, the injury still unhealed.

“Magnus?”

Magnus finally turns to him, and he doesn’t know what he looks like right now but it must not be good, based on the way Alec’s looking at him: wide-eyed and sad and strained, like Magnus’s distress is pulling at his very being.

“I’m okay,” Magnus says, which is possibly the least convincing thing he’s ever said. Alec’s hand comes to rest on his thigh, gentle, barely there, but Magnus flinches as pain flares up from his wound.

Alec yanks his hand away. “Wait, are you bleeding? Are you hurt? Magnus!”

“It’s not serious,” Magnus says weakly, but it’s too late, Alec’s already pulling out his phone to shine the flashlight on the wound.

“It _is_ serious,” he says, and before Magnus even realizes what he’s about to do, Alec’s picking him up.

“Alexander!” Magnus protests, flailing a bit as Alec starts walking away from the pier. “Put me _down!_ ”

“No.” His grip is firm, Magnus doesn’t think he could struggle out of his arms even if he wanted to. “Magnus, why didn’t you heal this? Are you low on magic?”

Magnus doesn’t know what to say to him. Alec, more than anyone else, will understand why he didn’t heal it.

When he doesn’t respond, Alec sighs and asks quietly, “Can you open a portal for us? I know you don’t want to be at home, and I’m sorry, but this needs to be bandaged.”

Magnus opens a portal.

Alec places him down on the couch with such care that a lump rises in Magnus’s throat. He doesn’t deserve this, not after avoiding Alec for hours for no reason.

“Stay here,” Alec says, patting Magnus’s knee. “I’ll get the first aid kit.”

“You don’t have to,” Magnus says. “I’ll heal it.”

“Are you sure?”

Magnus nods and directs a shaky stream of magic towards his injured leg, knitting the flesh back together until the wound is mostly healed. The blood loss is starting to get to him, and he has to sag back against the couch when he’s done. He shouldn’t have left it that long.

Alec takes his still-raised hand in his own, interlacing their fingers as he kneels on the floor. “Do you want to tell me why you didn’t want to come home?”

Magnus sighs. “I’m afraid I’m not myself today, Alexander.”

“I know.” Alec waits, and when Magnus doesn’t say any more, says, “That’s not an answer…”

When Magnus still doesn’t say anything, Alec’s face falls. “Or… is it?”

Magnus looks down at his hands. He tries to tug away the one Alec has caught between his fingers, but Alec won’t let it go. “I— I want this to be a safe space. I don’t want to bring all these negative emotions here.”

“Magnus, it’s supposed to be a safe space for _you_ , too.”

Magnus shakes his head. “No, you don’t get it.” He tries to explain, haltingly, “I’m—happy here, with you. I don’t want—to ruin that.”

“You can’t ruin it,” Alec says. He pulls Magnus’s hand to his heart. “You can’t ruin it. I’ll always be here for you.”

Magnus isn’t sure Alec understands what he’s agreeing to when he says that. That he understands how deep Magnus’s despair goes sometimes.

“Come on, Magnus,” Alec says, soft, teasing. “You think _I’m_ happy all the time? _Me?_ How could I expect that of you?”

“I’m not saying I’m supposed to _be_ happy all the time,” Magnus protests. “I just don’t want to bring it _home_.”

“Where else are you supposed to bring it?”

Magnus can only shrug in response. He doesn’t know. All he knows is that bringing it home has never ended well for him.

Alec keeps tugging on Magnus’s hand, playing with his rings. “Do you remember when— after that demon attacked the Institute, and you found me on your balcony?”

It’s clearly still a hard memory for him—he stumbles a little over the words, and Magnus’s heart pangs in sympathy.

“I remember,” he says.

Alec looks up at him as if in challenge. “Did you tell me not to bring it home?”

Magnus shakes his head. These aren’t comparable examples. The possession was horrific. This is—Magnus is upset over nothing at all. “It’s not the _same_ —” 

“It doesn’t have to be.” Alec holds Magnus’s gaze until Magnus has to look away, swallowing thickly at the intensity he sees there. “I’m never going to turn you away. Alright?”

“Okay,” Magnus says. There’s no derailing Alec once he has his heart set on something. This is not an argument Magnus can win.

Not that he’s sure he really wants to, anyway.

“Okay,” Alec repeats, and wraps himself around Magnus in a hug.

Magnus hugs him back, lets himself sag into Alec’s arms as the exhaustion hits him again, harder this time.

It’s been a really long day.

“Let’s go to bed, okay?” Alec says. “And we’ll talk about it in the morning.”

And Magnus finds that, for once, the idea doesn’t completely terrify him.

“Okay.”

**Author's Note:**

> [tumblr](https://cuubism.tumblr.com) :)


End file.
